Worth the Wait
by ulstergirl
Summary: Nancy and Ned grow closer while stranded in a mountain cabin with Bess and George during a snowstorm. Oneshot.


**Written for Elja in Nancy Drew Summerfest 2008. There is some underage drinking in this and a bit of innuendo, but nothing too terrible.**

--

Nancy sat at one of the picture windows, watching the snow beat against the glass. From every room in the cabin she could hear it. Even through Bess and George's bickering.

"If you'd packed a few less suitcases, we wouldn't have run out of gas so fast!"

"Like fifteen more feet down the road would have mattered! We're in the middle of nowhere!"

Nancy nodded in silent agreement, her blue eyes still tracing the slowly disappearing lines of the landscape. The sky was a pure blinding white. They had been lucky to find this place in the snow.

Tuning out the cousins' arguing, Nancy instead listened for Ned, who hadn't been able to sit down at the kitchen table and participate in the rapidly degenerating "discussion" of what the four of them should do. The phone hanging on the wall in the kitchen was eerily silent when they picked it up; the lines had probably gone down in the storm, along with the ones that would have supplied this place with power. Bess's cell phone was dead, and the remaining three were lined up on the kitchen counter, all showing no bars, no service whatsoever. Carson had joked about giving her a satellite phone for Christmas. She was starting to wish, only a little, that it had been more than a joke.

Shaking herself, Nancy stood and, shivering in her coat, followed the sound of Ned's grunts of exertion to the back door. He had his coat off; the long-sleeved henley he wore under his lined vest cast his arms into sharp muscular relief, as he shoveled another lump of snow, pivoted, and dumped it. When he sensed her gaze on him, he turned and smiled at her, and Nancy felt her heart skip a beat, even after all this time.

"You have to be freezing."

He shrugged, dipping his head to rub his forehead against one sleeve before he shoveled another lump of snow. "It's not too bad out here," he said, his voice slightly breathless. "The wind's almost peaceful, after being inside."

Nancy caught his subtle nod in Bess and George's direction, and she quirked her lips in an answering smile. "Once we figure out dinner they'll feel better. At least there's no way we'll starve."

Every canned food imaginable was in the cabin, even ones Nancy hadn't known could be canned. Though the space was small, the stunning view and remote location told her someone affluent owned it. Not everyone could afford to carve a site for a vacation home practically into the side of a mountain. She had found the hunting rifles in a locked closet, and while she knew Ned's father had taught him how to shoot, she was still far more comfortable with the idea of Ned going slowly crazy cooped up in the cabin with them, than going out into the snow with nary a cell phone or piece of modern technology to guide him. And the idea of gutting an animal made her feel slightly daunted and slightly more nauseated.

"Well," Ned said, peering up at the sky, "it looks like it's starting to taper off. If we're lucky, in the morning, it won't have gotten any deeper and we can start hiking back to town."

"Oh," Nancy said, feigning innocence, "I didn't know one of your fifteen major switches involved meteorology."

Ned glowered playfully at her, and a second later he had tossed the shovel into the snow and was sweeping her up into his arms. "I just don't think we should try to leave tonight," he told her, a certain gleam in his eye.

"Yeah, it is so dark out here and everything," Nancy said softly, searching his gaze, knowing full well that it was hours until sundown. He was so close to her, and his lips had just brushed hers when the front door of the cabin banged open.

"I'm not staying in there with her one more minute," Bess declared, anger radiating off her in waves.

Nancy sighed and relaxed her grip on the collar of Ned's vest, turning reluctantly to acknowledge Bess's tantrum. "I'll go talk to her," she offered, and Ned shot her a meaningful look before he reached for the shovel again.

"She's impossible!" Bess fumed. "And I am not hiking up to the town! It has to be twenty miles away!"

"At least," Nancy agreed, wrapping a comforting arm around Bess. "But it'll be okay. The storm can't last forever."

"Try telling George that," Bess muttered. "This is so inconvenient. I have tickets to a concert tomorrow night," she reminded Nancy, brushing blonde hair out of her blue eyes.

"If you miss it, I promise we'll go to another one this summer," Nancy said seriously. "Now let's get back inside before we freeze to death, and talk about what we're going to do."

At sundown, the wind grew even louder, and during the worst gusts the four of them could feel the house trembling very gently around them. Bess made them all mugs of makeshift hot cocoa, and George assembled aluminum foil packets of whatever she could find. It wasn't the best meal Nancy had ever eaten, but she was so hungry from mediating between Bess and George all day, and the stress of being snowbound, that she barely tasted the food as it went down.

When it was too dark to play another game of cards or ignore the howling of the wind, George took a quarter out of her pocket. "We'll flip for the bed," she said.

Nancy glanced over at the couch, which held a fold-out bed, and the large comfortable armchair. In the master bedroom was a large luxurious bed, but there were plenty of blankets, and she couldn't imagine being comfortable with the four of them bundled into the only real bed. Even though it would be warm, she realized, shivering in her coat.

"Heads," Ned called, swirling the last of his cocoa in the mug before swallowing it. The air around them was so cold that it turned hot food icy in minutes. He grimaced at the taste and she frowned in sympathy.

"Tails," George crowed when she revealed the coin. "All right!"

"The only way I'm splitting a bed with you is if you promise to not say a single word to me once we're in it," Bess said seriously, already glancing toward the overnight bag she and Nancy had gone back to the car to retrieve.

George sighed. "In five minutes you'll be snoring anyway," she said, ducking as Bess chased her into the room.

When they were alone, Nancy turned to Ned with a soft smile. "So, want to flip for the sofa-bed?" she asked, pulling a quarter out of her own pocket.

Ned shook his head, putting his hand on hers. "You can take it," he conceded. "Or the chair, if that looks more comfortable."

Nancy tilted her head. "You sure?"

"Definitely," he said, bending over to untie his shoes. "Just make sure you get us plenty of blankets."

While Ned vanished with his own overnight bag, considerably smaller than the veritable steamer trunk Bess used, Nancy made her way quietly into the master bedroom, as Bess and George tossed insults at each other, and emerged from the linen closet with four blankets hugged to her chest. George glanced over her shoulder at Nancy, then raised an eyebrow.

"And what are those for?"

"Well, if you two can sleep in the same bed without killing each other, I thought I'd sleep on the pull-out sofa bed," Nancy said archly.

"I thought you'd let Ned have it," Bess mumbled, her toothbrush hanging out of her mouth.

Nancy glanced over at the bed. "Yeah, well. I think all three of us could fit in there as long as didn't move after."

"It's not that bad," George scoffed.

"It's just for a night," Nancy soothed. "It's no big deal. But I'll go ahead and get changed in here."

Even once she had her flannel pajamas on, Nancy was still shivering. The cold was so awful that it almost burned. She wrapped herself in a thick snug blanket that smelled fresh out of its plastic bag and went to the windows, throwing open the shutters. The view was spectacular, even if her teeth were chattering. From the angle, the horizon was so low beneath them that it felt like she was floating in space. She sat down on the edge of the sofa bed and hugged her knees to her chest, unable to take her eyes off the sky. The stars were clear. There was almost no light pollution, this far out.

"It's almost worth it, isn't it."

She glanced over at her boyfriend, dressed in an Emerson sweatsuit, and he came over to sit down beside her, dropping his overnight bag on the floor on the way.

"Worth it to be stuck here?"

He nodded. "Do you know that during the entire case we said maybe two words to each other that weren't about it?"

Nancy closed her eyes. "Yeah," she admitted. "I can't help it."

He shrugged, and she felt the movement even though she didn't look at him. "I know," he said, and there was no accusation in his voice. He dropped a kiss on her forehead, then gathered up a few of the spare blankets and made himself a sort of cocoon in the recliner. Nancy sat watching the stars for a few more minutes, listening to the fire as it whispered itself to grey ash, then went to the shutters, closing them all save one. The wind was kicking up again; she could feel it singing along the walls, rattling the glass in the panes.

For a long time after she lay down on the uncomfortable bed, her elbow cradling her head against the hard pillow, she kept staring out the window, away from her boyfriend. She couldn't really remember, exactly, the last time they'd had an opportunity to be alone, to really be alone, without some interruption. And here, even, they weren't really alone; Bess and George were in the next room, and would be, for the rest of the trip. Ned was generally patient, but even he had to break sometime.

She shifted in the bed and groaned softly. Her feet were like blocks of ice, and with every movement she made, however slight, the cocoon around her shifted and let in another gust of cool air. Her flannel shirt was twisted and had risen to just below her breasts, and her pants were low on her hips. She made a face and pulled the comforter up over her numb face, her teeth chattering.

From behind her she heard Ned climb out of his chair, and then the shutter coming over the window, which would have left the room in darkness. She burrowed a little deeper into her nest of blankets, trying to move as little as she could. Then she felt the bed shift under Ned's weight, and a sudden drift of cold wind down her back made her suck in a swift, startled breath. Then she felt Ned nestle in behind her, his knees tucked up to curve with hers, his arm coming over her to pull her in close. Little by little she began to relax into his warmth, the comforting sound of him breathing just against her hair.

"Better?"

She nodded, still shivering a little. "Thanks."

He kissed the crown of her head. "You know I think you're the most beautiful girl in the world," he said, his voice low and husky.

And in that moment Nancy felt a warmth spread inside her that made her not care about the blankets or the blue-white world outside or anything other than the two of them. "And I love you," she whispered, sliding her hand over his.

--

The sullen glow of the sky woke Nancy in the morning. She turned her face into the pillow, scowling, her legs and arms cramped tight from the chill. When she remembered that she wasn't alone, she rolled onto her back, only to find that Ned wasn't where she remembered him. The pillow was still dented from where his head had lain, but the sheets were warm only where she touched them.

The back door creaked open and Nancy half-rose immediately, her breath catching in her dry throat, suddenly aware that her hair was a mass of tangles across her forehead and cheeks and that a few of the buttons on her flannel nightshirt had managed to loose themselves. Ned swiftly closed the door behind himself and stamped the snow from his boots, a few hefty chunks of firewood in his arms.

"Ugh. There's no coffee, is there."

At the sound of George's voice Nancy startled guiltily. She had pushed herself up on her elbows, and didn't doubt, from the calculated way Ned was keeping himself from looking at her, that her pose had looked a bit provocative. George, bundled for warmth in a sweatsuit, had one arm nestled against her stomach, the other hand rubbing fiercely at her sleep-bleared eyes as she stood in the master bedroom's doorway.

"There isn't," Ned apologized, finally finding his voice, and the husky rasp of it made Nancy draw the covers tighter around herself. "But I can bring in a bowl of snow to melt, if you want to boil it over the fire and make some."

George yawned hugely. "A few cups of coffee and we'll be ready to get out of here," she said, and Nancy could already see her planning what wicked tactic she'd use to wake her cousin.

Ned gave a low, sarcastic laugh. "Um, I doubt it," he returned, and winced as he opened the door behind him.

Nancy and George both gasped at the sight. Ned had to throw his shoulder against it to open it more than a few feet; overnight, the clean smooth blanket of snow had grown by several inches, and from the vague blinding color of the sky overhead and the size of the flakes still falling, it wasn't going to let up anytime soon.

"Great," George said in disgust, neatly summing up Nancy's feelings. "So what do we do?"

Ned shot a loaded glance over at Nancy, one that sent a hot blush into her cheeks. "Nan and I were talking last night," he began, and walked over to the fireplace to put the wood in. "Maybe there's a way we can get power in here. I checked the phone again and it's still not working, but at least we can be comfortable while we wait it out. And we're definitely going to have to wait this out."

"What, are we going to rig up some sort of kite-and-key contraption?" George asked, crossing her arms. "'Get power'?"

"If there's a breaker we need to flip," Nancy explained, sweeping her hair back as she held the covers to her chest. "Maybe a generator. Something."

"So let's go."

Ned shook his head. "Nan and I will go look," he said. "You and Bess can stay here and try the phones, figure out supplies, that kind of thing."

"Why not me and Nancy?" George had a contentious gleam in her eye. "Why not all four of us? Divide and conquer, what?"

"Because Bess doesn't do this kind of thing well," Nancy replied. "And we have two winter coats between us. And I think if Ned doesn't get out there and do something, he's going to go stir-crazy."

Ned nodded gratefully at her interpretation. "So, if you want to get going...?"

"Definitely," she nodded, scrambling out of bed, wincing when her bare feet touched the cold hardwood. While she was washing her face and giving herself a quick once-over, she could still hear George arguing with Ned.

"I'm not going to just hang out here like Frontier Barbie. That's Bess's job. Didn't you say there were some hunting rifles in here?"

"Yeah..." Ned said, not sounding the least bit sure.

"Maybe I could go hunting."

Ned laughed. "When I said we were stuck here, I didn't mean it'd be for months. And have you ever even been hunting?"

"Of course," George defended herself. "Although honestly it's the stalking part that appeals to me, not the actual killing."

"Maybe later."

Leaving a mildly sullen George behind, Nancy and Ned didn't look at each other until they were well away from the cabin, the perpetual wind snatching the air practically from beneath their noses. Nancy shivered under her coat and Ned took her gloved hand in his own.

"I was thinking we could hike back to the road and see if we can find a power line," Ned shouted to her, and she nodded, her eyes flooding under her sunglasses. Their progress was slow; the snow was practically up to her knees, and when they finally did reach the road Nancy wanted nothing more than to collapse under the shelter of a tree and rest for a few minutes. Their abandoned car was pulled well over to the side, and with a practiced eye Nancy could make out a few nearly obscured tracks through the snow, but anyone would have to be crazy to attempt it in this weather, especially if the plows didn't come through. Ned turned to her and raised his eyebrow, and she shrugged a little.

From the road they started back, making a wide circle that took longer than their direct path from the cabin. They were quiet, but the whole world sounded hushed, muffled from the snow, in a stillness so loud it roared. It was at the edge of the treeline that Nancy first saw a much smaller cabin, like a doghouse designed for a human adult.

"The generator," Nancy sighed, when they stepped inside, out of the snow. While she brushed the accumulated flakes from her hood and shoulders, Ned stepped in and shivered behind her, eyeing the still machine.

"All right," he said approvingly. "Now we just need to get it working."

Nancy spotted a red plastic gasoline jug in the corner and headed toward it, keeping an eye out for spiders or anything else that might have found their sanctuary from the cold. "Well, if this is what I think it is, maybe we should all just hike back to the car and take our chances," she said, sloshing it so they could hear the contents.

Ned pointed to a sticker above the control panel. "Diesel," he read. "Wouldn't do any good in the car."

Nancy sat back, leaning against the wall, and watched her boyfriend work. Twice he glanced over his shoulder at her, but neither time did he say anything.

"Is there something you need me to do?" she finally asked, concerned.

He was quiet for another minute. "Last night," he began, but didn't continue.

Nancy waited a beat before responding lightly, "Last night what?"

"I guess I'm wondering whether I need to apologize."

He kept his head ducked over his work, and Nancy shoved her hands in her pockets, then walked toward him. "I can't think of anything you need to apologize for," she replied, gently bumping her arm against his.

He half-smiled. "Then I guess I won't," he said.

--

With the generator working, George and Bess's moods had brighted considerably by the time Nancy and Ned made it back to the cabin, having made a few more unexpected detours on the way. The first thing Bess did was take a long, luxurious shower, and her rhapsodies about how clean she felt made Nancy practically squirm, uncomfortable. Ned was taking his turn in the shower when Nancy dealt a desultory hand of gin rummy, aware the entire time of how greasy her hair must be.

"If we're lucky tomorrow, we'll be able to get out of here," she began.

Bess sighed, propping her chin in her hand as she glanced down at the cards in the other. "I almost don't want to leave," she said wistfully.

George turned a theatrically shocked face in her cousin's direction. "All day long you were saying that if we didn't get out of here in an hour, two tops, you were going to rip my arm off and beat me to death with it!"

"Like I could," Bess said witheringly. "I just feel so much better." She ran a hand through her clean, light hair. "Think about it. How long has it been since we've gone on a regular vacation?"

"With Nancy?" George let out a derisive snort.

"Hey," Nancy objected, putting her hand face-down on the table. "Are you saying it isn't fun?"

"Sure it's fun," Bess said, and a teasing look came over her face. "If you mean counting the number of grey hairs I've grown when I get home."

"And I get a lot of chance to practice judo," George grinned wickedly.

Nancy shook her head. "You two just don't have any sense of what fun is," she dismissed. "See if I invite you along next time."

"To get shot at, poisoned, kidnapped, or roughed up," Bess pretended to muse. "You're right. That's excitement you just can't buy at a travel agency."

"I'm surprised you didn't come across some poor guy half-buried in a snowdrift when you were out looking for the generator," George said, then peered at Nancy in sudden suspicion. "You two were gone for a while, though. Did you?"

Nancy rubbed the bridge of her nose. "No half-dead snowskiiers, no buried pirate's gold, nothing," she said. "It just took Ned a while to get the generator started."

"Thank God." Bess had put a sweater and her coat on after her shower, to keep the chill from her still-damp skin. Now she shrugged out of the coat. "I guess tonight George and I won't have to sleep all spooned up to keep warm."

"Well, we can't keep the generator running forever," Nancy pointed out. "Especially if something happens and we're stuck here again tomorrow."

"Ugh," George said unhappily, but agreed. "There's only so many more hands of cards I can play before I snap, though." Bess nodded vehemently.

"So we can switch and you guys sleep on the sofa-bed tonight?" Nancy asked, barely daring to look up.

"Well, you do deserve something nice," Bess decided, tossing her clean hair again. "I haven't enjoyed a shower that much in ages, even if we are going to end up turning the damn thing off."

Ned came back from his shower, his hair still barely damp against his temples, and leaned down to kiss Nancy, and she turned toward him and leaned into it, tasting toothpaste and clean. "Hey," she whispered when he pulled back, her eyelashes fluttering as she gazed into his eyes.

"Hey," he smiled, his fingers trailing over her back, between her shoulder blades. "Give it about ten minutes, okay?"

Nine and a half minutes later Nancy was standing in the shower, hair a soapy mass of bubbles from her shampoo, antibacterial lather in her palms, and she was smiling. The water pressure wasn't high, but the water was steaming hot, and the thought of climbing into clean pajamas and falling asleep between clean sheets, secure in her boyfriend's arms, made her almost shiver with joy.

"You're getting soft, Drew," she murmured to herself, rinsing swirls of lather from her arms. "Used to be roughing it for a few days was cake."

They kept the generator on for an hour after Nancy stepped out of the shower, long enough for her to dry her hair, long enough for them to build a fire and assemble another makeshift meal. George found the switch and volunteered to hike back out to the generator shack and make sure everything was in order, while Bess and Nancy washed dishes, and Ned brought in enough firewood to keep the cabin above freezing for the rest of the night.

"Ready to turn in?"

Bess shot Nancy a loaded glance, smothering a pointed giggle under her hand. Ned was standing in the doorway leading into the master bedroom, leaning against the frame with his arms crossed, the firelight dancing in his eyes. Nancy dried off her hands with a dishtowel, answering his smile with one of her own as George walked back in.

"Whew, it's cold out there! Feels great in here."

"Yeah. Hey, want to play dominoes?" Bess nudged her cousin.

"Sure," George replied. "You two in?"

Nancy and Ned exchanged a helpless glance, even as Bess burst out laughing. "George, they—"

"Yeah, why not," Nancy interrupted. "Maybe a round or two before we go to bed."

"Or, hell, why not all twelve," Bess said, disappearing into the pantry. She returned with a dusty bottle of wine and a corkscrew.

"Are you sure about this?" Nancy said worriedly, as Ned came over to put his arm around her.

"After everything else we've eaten or used?" Bess asked, twisting the screw in. "It's not like they'd have left this wine here if they didn't want us to drink it."

"That made absolutely no sense," George replied, and they all jumped a little when the cork popped.

The first bottle went quickly, and when Nancy finished her first glass she was already flushed. Halfway through the second bottle, she could feel Ned's knee brushing hers under the table, and then his fingers against her own, while he feigned glances at her tiles. Bess was more giggly than usual, George's laughter loud and genuine, and while they were all four seated around that small table in the empty cabin in the middle of nowhere, Nancy felt a happy warmth swell in her chest. Everything was all right. In the morning they would find a way back to civilization and everything would be all right.

Nancy crowed as she won her second round of the night, and Bess and George sighed and started counting up their scores. Ned leaned over, his mouth warm against her ear, and whispered, "Come here, I have to show you something."

She was a little confused, stumbling a little, as Ned took her hand and led her to the bedroom. "Goodnight, you two," he called, and their protests and catcalls were lost as he shouldered the door closed behind him and swept Nancy up into his arms.

"What was it you had to show me?" she murmured, searching his eyes.

"Nothing," he replied, and gave her a kiss so sweet it tingled all the way down to her toes, before he led them to the bed. The sheets were cold at first, but his arms were warm around her, and soon she could think of nothing more than his kiss.

She was brought crashing back to earth when the door suddenly swung open, bouncing off the wall with a loud thwack. Immediately she and Ned sprang apart, and she sat up, clutching the sheet against her chest. "What the hell?" she demanded, already insanely angry at Bess, who was probably laughing her ass off.

"Get dressed, ma'am."

The shape in the doorway resolved into the figure of a man wearing a Stetson, his eyes cold. The lamplight gleamed off his polished badge, the shine of his shoes. Behind him Nancy could see Bess and George, gesticulating wildly at another officer.

"You're going to be coming with us."

--

Eight hours, four cups of coffee, and countless hours of interrogation later, the sun was coming up, and Nancy had never been more glad to see it. Her father had managed to jump on a plane a mere hour after she had first called, and he was shaking hands with the sheriff's deputies who had crashed in on the cabin while Bess and George cleaned the fingerprint ink off their hands.

She hadn't even been able to look at Ned.

"I don't want to know," her father said, when they walked out of the building together, Nancy too full of nervous energy to stay sitting too long. "I just don't."

"We were going to freeze to death if we didn't—"

Carson held up a hand, silencing her almost hysterical explanation. "I know you were going to freeze to death if you didn't find shelter. And I know you had to eat. But I saw the two empty bottles of wine, and I saw your breathalyzer results, and if your 'hypothermia,'" she could almost hear the quotes around the word, "is the reason you and Ned were in the bed, alone, and practically if not fully naked—"

"Dad..."

"What?" he asked, turning to her with a mildly curious look on his face. "I'd like to hear this."

She opened her mouth a few times without anything coming out, then answered lamely, "I thought you didn't want to know."

"I don't," he answered, bemused. "I think whatever lie you were about to concoct would be fun to hear, though."

Nancy sighed, disgusted, and kicked at a rock. "So what happens now?"

"The four of you split the cost of repairing what you did in that cabin," Carson said, his tone brooking no argument. "And for a professional cleaning service to come in. Out of your own allowance."

Nancy set her jaw, huddling deeper into her coat.

"And you and Ned are not to see each other for two weeks."

"I'm nineteen!" Nancy blurted incredulously. "You can't ground me!"

Carson silenced her with a glare. "What you four did back there wasn't the behavior of an adult; you were acting like irresponsible teenagers, in a house that wasn't yours, and until the both of you can start acting like actual responsible human beings, I think it would be better for you to keep apart and get your priorities in order."

"So you're saying you wouldn't have done what we did, in the same situation."

"I didn't say that," Carson replied, his eyes sparkling just a little. "I'm going to go get the car."

Nancy pulled out her cell phone, relieved to see the single bar of reception.

"Hello?"

Ned had gone on ahead and was in their rental car, having it gassed up at the local service station before they began the trip to the airport, again. She could hear the wind whipping around him.

"Hey," she replied. "Everything going okay?"

"Yeah," Ned replied, a little cautiously. "Does your Dad have a hunting rifle out for me yet?"

"Not quite," she replied. "But he did say that we aren't to see each other for two weeks."

"But you're over eighteen!" Ned spluttered, after a moment of shocked silence.

"I know," she agreed. "I guess he thinks two weeks will cool us off, so we don't... make any bad decisions."

"Oh," Ned said quietly. "You know, really... other than drinking all that wine, I don't think we made that many."

"Me either." Nancy twisted a strand of hair around her finger. "So let's see if we still feel the same way in two weeks."

She tried to keep her voice light, but Ned's voice, low and clear, sent shivers down her spine anyway.

"I'll feel the same way in two weeks or two years," he said. "You're worth the wait."


End file.
